Tameside Council votes against government changes

Tameside Council will soon be breaking the law if they hold planning panel meetings or make planning decisions – as things stand.

The latest town hall meeting saw the council vote against new government reforms coming into effect on October 31. The changes made by Whitehall will effectively reduce the power of committees by reducing their size (maximum of 13 members) and the number of applications they decide on.

Many local authorities need to change their constitutions to facilitate these changes and be able to continue their role as a Local Planning Authority (LPA). 

Tameside council failed to agree to the constitution change in Dukinfield Town Hall on October 6. The council’s legal officer explained that voting against the changes means any planning decision made after October 31 would be unlawful and no planning committee meetings could legally take place in Tameside.

Deputy council leader Cllr Andrew McLaren added that any planning decisions after October 31 would be open to legal challenge, costing the council ‘thousands, thousands and thousands of pounds’.

Reform leader Allan Hopwood called the government changes ‘egregious’ and claimed this was a vote with a ‘gun to the head’. Cllr Hopwood and a number of colleagues told the chamber of their disgust at what they saw as taking away the voice of local residents.

Conservative leader Andrea Colbourne added: “Many applications that were previously put through elected councillors will be decided by council officers. Residents, quite rightly, expect that when major developments in their area come in there will be a transparent process.”

Planning panel chair David Mills explained he didn’t agree with all the changes, but tried to assure the chamber there would still be democracy for local residents. Cllr McLaren told the council they had a responsibility as a council to remain within the law and do their duty as a LPA, despite their feelings towards the changes. 

Only the Labour group voted in favour of the changes, but they lost by a narrow margin.  It is likely that an extraordinary meeting of the council will take place before October 31 to re-consider the matter, the council was told.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) say they have made these changes in order to speed up the approval of developments and see all councils operate planning in the same way.

Currently, different councils have varied approaches to planning committees, although they are largely similar. Subtle differences between local authorities are how long objectors can speak, who can call-in decisions or how many councillors can sit on a planning committee.

Under the new rules planning applications would be split into two tiers – Schedule 1 applications and Schedule 2 applications, designated by planning officers. Schedule 1 includes smaller and more technical applications that would only be dealt with by planning officers.

Schedule 2 covers larger applications, which may be brought before the planning committee, if agreed by the planning committee chair and the council’s chief planning officer.

Examples would be an attic conversion on a semi-detached house in Schedule 1 and a skyscraper with 1,250 homes in Schedule 2. 

The changes would also reduce the size of planning committees and require all members to undergo a formal training process.